Spotlight On Svetlana Abrosimova

JOHN ALTAVILLA, jaltavilla@courant.comThe Hartford Courant

Abrosimova, 29, was born in St. Petersburg, Russia and while playing for Petrogradskoi N86 (high school) began training with the Russian national team. She was MVP of the 1998 European Basketball Championships after being recruited by UConn through the help of a Russian intermediary who brought teams to the United States to play exhibitions again American college teams.

She spent three years alongside Sue Bird, Swin Cash, Asjha Jones and Tamika Williams and helped the Huskies win the 2000 NCAA Championship. She played in 127 games for the Huskies before her career was ended by a foot injury at Tennessee in her senior season (2000-01). She scored 1,865 points for the Huskies and was a Big East first-teamer three times, the Big East player of the year as a sophomore. She was also an Associated Press first-team All-American in 1999-2000. She was an original inductee into the Huskies of Honor in 2006.

WNBA career: Abrosimova was the No. 7 overall pick of the 2001 WNBA Draft. She spent seven seasons with the Minnesota Lynx, including two playing for current Seattle Storm coach Brian Agler. After a brief stint with the Connecticut Sun following the 2008 Olympics, Abrosimova took the 2009 WNBA campaign off before signing with the Storm before the 2010 season. She was also a member of the Russian national team that won the silver medal in the 2000 Summer Olympics.

Back in business: Long ago were the days when Abrosimova was known for her tom boy haircut and soft smile. She was barely 17 when she came to the United States to play basketball at UConn and she could barely speak English.

Now she is a grown woman, a seasoned international star, known affectionately by her friends and teammates as the "Russian Princess" because of her fondness for clothes.

And even after all this time she is still playing professionally, and once again in the WNBA with the Seattle Storm.

After the 2008 season, she said she didn't feel like playing competitively interested her anymore.

"This is my passion and when I feel like I'm a little tired of it, I'm not going to force myself to do it," Abrosimova told the Seattle Times recently. "When I felt like it was just a job, I was like, 'It's time to stop.' I was on a good team, we were winning and I still didn't get the joy out of it because it was too much emotions and I was getting empty inside."